I have a question. Do the WS ever give all of themselves back to the spouse after D-day, or do they still save or not give the part that was given to the OM/OW. The reason I am asking is that I sometimes feel like the wife, mother, and somewhat of a lover but yet, as a lover my H does not give all of himself to me. I asked him to write me a love letter (like the ones her wrote to the OW), and he was not able to. He said that if I wanted that part of him he could marry someone else to budget, raise children etc... with and he would see me on the weekends, then I could have that side of him. I think he is unwilling to give up that part of himself up to me as he was very much in love with the OW. The A ended it's self over time. D-day was in Sept, and I cannot find any traces of contact. I really hate her and so much wish that she would drop off the ends of the earth! I fear that if he does not give his all to me he could fall back to her.

My gut reaction is to not give my total self to him, yet on the other hand do the thing I need to so that he will fall in love with me, and I would hope in the near future he would give all of himself to me. The romantic side.

Anyone else deal with this?

Dear t456,

I'm so sorry for your obvious pain. There are few hurts greater than feeling that the spouse you love, won't give themselves fully to you, but they gave that to another.

I am going to go out on a limb here, because I'm presuming a lot without knowing much of your story. I think that he might be viewing you as being in a mother role. You took over for dear old Mom when you married him and now he is looking for a lover on the side. You can't love Mom like you love a lover and he can't reconcile those two parts of himself.

There is a book that I just recommended on another post to 4Give called Mothers, Sons and Lovers by Michael Gurian. Check it out and see if any of it fits. It's written a little strangely, but there is some profound stuff in there!

It would be interesting to find out your Enneagram personality types. There is an excellent book available very inexpensively called The Essential Enneagram by Daniels and Price. It has a great test built in and gives you enough information after you type yourself to begin working with. This information is one of the tools that has helped transform my H into a man instead of a boy. He now realizes that he spent most of his adult life in the "victim" role and that he didn't take responsibility for his own happiness. Now he is learning to do that partly through finding out his Enneagram type. It's been powerful for us!

About myself...I discovered that as a Type One that I actually shunned my own sexuality! I felt that it was somehow dirty or even wrong! Now I realize that it is a vital part of myself that I have to nurture. It's really awakened me to that sexual part of myself. I actually feared my own sexuality.

I hope you can see how much help this can be. Our therapists told us about it initially and required us to type ourselves so that they would understand us better. The insight it has given us and them is profound.

Take care of yourself. Just remember that he has a lot of soul searching and healing to do. What he did to you and your family was a terrible thing, but what he did to himself was even worse in a way. He compromised his integrity and for my personality type anyway, that's an awful thing to have to reckon with.

He does need to move forward and help you heal as well, but until he realizes the full magnitude of what he has done, why he has done it and gets very real about the ugly truth of it, he can't. It sounds as though he still romanticizes his relationship with the OW. That's got to go and hopefully it will eventually.

Don't hide your pain from him. He needs to see it. He needs to feel your love too...it's not one or the other. They can both go hand in hand without lovebusting.

God bless...

Stillwed